Luft was previously believed to be a key figure in House Republicans' probe into the Biden family's alleged corrupt foreign business dealings, although was reported "missing" by GOP figures. Prosecutors have said that Luft was arrested on February 17, but subsequently fled after being released on bail and remains a fugitive.
One of the officials whom Luft is accused of covertly attempting to "recruit and pay, on behalf of principals based in China" was an adviser to the then President-elect Donald Trump, according to a 58-page indictment.
While he is not named in the indictment, the official is believed to be former CIA Director James Woolsey, who was a national security adviser to Trump during the 2016 election, reported the New York Post and The Messenger. Woolsey resigned from Trump's transition team just before the Republican took office at the White House in January 2017. There is no indication that Trump was aware of Luft's alleged offending at the time. Newsweek has contacted Trump's office for comment via email.
An unsealed indictment shows that Gal Luft, a dual Israeli-U.S. citizen and head of the Analysis of Global Security think tank, was charged with acting as a Chinese agent. Luft also faces charges stemming from his alleged attempts to broker arms deals and the illegal sale of Iranian oil.
Luft was arrested in Cyprus earlier this year but is currently a fugitive after skipping bail while awaiting extradition to the United States. This comes after Comer spent months touting the House Oversight Committee’s informant on President Joe Biden and Hunter Biden, just for the whistleblower to go MIA.
Since Comer complained about his critics who’ve made fun of him on MSNBC in the past, Mika Brzezinski commented on “the stupidity” as Willie Geist recapped all of this for Morning Joe.
This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for today:
The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN has warned of a “grim picture” in the marshes in southern Iraq due to climate change and water scarcity.
Drought-hit Iraq is going through a severe water crisis with supplies dwindling in its main rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, coupled with a continuing heatwave in which temperatures are exceeding 50°C in some areas of the country.
This has turned large parts of Iraq, including the fabled wetlands – a Unesco World Heritage Site – into arid areas, forcing many of the occupants to migrate to urban areas.
“The marshes are experiencing the most severe heatwave in the last 40 years, accompanied with a sudden water shortage in the Euphrates river,” the food agency said in a statement late on Monday.
“The dire situation is having a devastating impact on the marshes system; buffalo producers, farmers, and fisheries, forcing many of them to leave their homes and migrate … searching for drinking water, food, feed and employment,” it said.
“Unfortunately, the current situation in July 2023 reflects a grim picture,” it warned, expressing concerns over the “grave consequences” of climate change and the shortage in water.
Iraq's parliament on Monday approved a 2023 budget of 198.9 trillion dinars ($153 billion) that sets out record spending on a growing public wage bill and development projects to improve services and rebuild infrastructure ruined by neglect and war.
The budget deficit is estimated at a record 64.36 trillion Iraq dinars, more than double the last budget deficit in 2021, according to a budget document and lawmakers.
It only took over six months and a scolding from the United Nations' Security Council, but they finally passed a 2023 budget. Sinan Mahoud (THE NATIONAL) adds:
But analysts said far too much money will be spent on salaries, including allocations for hundreds of thousands of new jobs. They said Iraq will not be able to afford this spending outlay if oil prices fall below $70.
The operational expenditure stands at 133.22 trillion dinars (about $102.5 billion) while investment expenditure will be 49.35 trillion dinars ($37.9 billion). The remainder of expenditure will mainly go to debt servicing.
It is based on an assumed average oil price over three years of $70 a barrel, with an average daily crude oil output of 3.5 million barrels, including 400,000 from the Kurdistan region.
The government of Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al Sudani is planning to repeat it next year and in 2025, although parliament will be able to vote on amendments. Iraq’s fiscal year usually starts on January 1.
On June 12, it passed a generous budget through the parliament – the biggest in Iraq’s history – which is supposed to fund its plan to expand essential services, such as electricity and water provision and build new infrastructure and housing in major cities. But these initiatives are by far not enough to address the severe political, socioeconomic and climate challenges the country is facing.
Those necessitate major reforms in the political and economic sectors, which the government does not have the mandate to undertake. Sooner or later, the suppressed political crisis will resurface.
Last year, the Western sanctions imposed on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine, combined with oil supply shortages, caused a surge in oil prices, with the average price per barrel reaching $100.
This resulted in handsome profits for energy exporters, including Iraq, which saw its oil revenues jump from $75.5bn in 2021 to $115bn in 2022.
[. . .]
It is crucial to note that Iraq’s financial stability is heavily dependent on the price of oil, which is an unstable factor. The country also has a significant budget deficit, estimated at $49bn in the 2023 budget. In the event of a decline in the price of oil, the country would face significant financial difficulties which could quickly translate into political instability.
Furthermore, the current state of affairs – while appearing positive to some observers – is exacerbating Iraq’s major problems. Pouring money into armed groups only strengthens them and further weakens the state. It makes it that much more difficult – if not impossible – for the government to get back monopoly over the use of force in the country.
Other methods include investing in renewable energy plants, recycling more, financing green companies and startups that are involved in renewable and green energy, agriculture, conserving water and upgrading old irrigation methods, and preserving the country’s biodiversity, as well as reducing Iraq’s carbon dioxide emissions.
When it comes to these important fields, the development of domestic, knowledge-based industries has arguably become an urgent necessity, rather than a welcome add-on.
It is worth noting that, as a developing country, Iraq has disproportionately experienced the impacts of loss and damage caused by climate change. This is why it is important to point out that tackling the climate crisis requires all countries, especially the developed ones, to take action. This means that poorer countries need support in order to adapt to and address the climate crisis.
In the long term, if some of the damage from climate change, such as water scarcity and a lack of agricultural resources, continues to increase in Iraq to the extent that freshwater resources are depleted, this will have an impact on national security and political stability. Such devastating impacts can also lead to a decrease in human health.
Thousands of dead fish have washed ashore in southeast Iraq, prompting an official investigation into the wildlife disaster that officials said Monday may be linked to drought conditions.
Recently, a large number of dead fish were washed up on the banks of the Amshan river in Maysan province, which borders Iran.
Khodr Abbas Salman, a Maysan province official, has verified that some of the factors that led to these dead fish were the lack of oxygen in the river and the rise in salinity.
An environmental campaigner, Ahmed Saleh Neema, also acknowledged that it is the rising temperature that contributes to the increasing salinity and low oxygen levels in the water. It has not yet been ascertained whether toxic chemical substances also caused the huge numbers of dead fish.
When many thousands of Iraqis turn on their taps “nothing comes out”, said Hayder Indhar for Phys.org.
So dire is the country’s water crisis – 7 million of its citizens have reduced access to water, according to the UN – many villagers are relying on “sporadic tanker-truck deliveries and salty wells” for drinking water.
While Iraq is known in Arabic as the Land of the Two Rivers, split as it is by the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers, the water levels of both have fallen markedly. The results have been no less than devastating.
For Firas Mohammed, a former fisherman, life has been totally transformed by the shortage. Gesturing towards a “trickle of lime green liquid nearby”, he told Al Jazeera that “even dogs avoid it”. “If the government decided to move us to a camp with freshwater to cope with this crisis, we would even accept being moved to Ukraine,” he added.
Mou’ad Abel was able to return to his village in 2016 “after the area was liberated from ISIL”, but despite also working as a fisherman in his youth, he was shocked to discover “there are no fish anymore”, the news site added.
The reasons behind the crisis are numerous. Some cite shortages and low river levels in neighbouring countries; others point to the alleged mismanagement of water by local authorities. Regardless of who is to blame, one thing is abundantly clear: the issue must be solved before it becomes too late for the millions of people reliant on a clean water supply.
According to the United Nations, some “90 per cent of the country’s rivers are polluted”. Iraq is facing a “critical climate emergency”, said Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, the UN special representative for Iraq, as by 2035 it is thought the nation will have the capacity to “meet only 15 per cent of its water demands”.
Desertification – the process by which fertile land becomes arid – is also a growing concern within the nation. It can be caused by both human factors and climate change.
Recurring reports since 2021 have indicated Iraq has been negotiating deals for 12 JF-17 Thunder from Pakistan and 14 Dassault Rafale fighter jets from France. Baghdad is either exploring its options or plans on acquiring both combat aircraft.
Iraq reportedly concluded a $664 million deal for 12 JF-17 Block 3 jets from Pakistan following over two years of negotiations, The News International in Pakistan reported on July 9, citing unnamed sources.
There is no good explanation for what Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is doing, unless you think he can win GOP votes by proving he hates gay people.
As hardball politics go, this is dubious strategy.
Is there is a single voter now with former President Trump who will jump to DeSantis because the governor has tape of Trump saying nice things about gay and transgender people? Has DeSantis seen political gain in attacking drag shows?
What Kennedy does undeniably desire is public attention, something his presidential campaign is delivering, with critical profiles in the Washington Post, the New York Times, Time, the Atlantic and a particularly damning and comprehensive one by Rebecca Traister in New York magazine. In just a couple of months, Kennedy has gone from “that anti-vaccine guy” to a staple of cable news coverage, making him The Top Kennedy for now, even if much of the publicity is bad. It’s always been a competitive clan, so he’s got to be happy that he now occupies a larger presence in the public mind than his cousin Caroline Kennedy, an ambassador to Japan and now Australia, larger than her brother John Kennedy Jr., who dominated the headlines until his accidental death in 1999. Because it’s been so long since his father and famous uncles died, Bobby Jr. might even have eclipsed them as The Top Kennedy among younger voters.
The political gene, which often comes bundled with the one for narcissism, never adequately thrives until fed by some form of adulation. Even the negative adulation of the recent profiles can be read as “I must be doing something right because they’re all knocking me” for somebody as thirsty for attention as Kennedy. He’s winning there, too.
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